BIOGRAPHY: Mary Quant Lifetime twitter BIOGRAPHY Immortalised by fashion iconography as the originator of the mini skirt, London designer Mary Quant had an art-school background and had been designing and manufacturing her own clothes since the late 50s. Mary Quant was born on 11 February 1934 in Blackheath, London, to Welsh teachers Jack and Mary Quant, who were originally from mining families. She went to Blackheath High School before studying illustration at Goldsmiths College. Quant achieved a diploma in Art Education from Goldsmiths and went on to become an apprentice couture milliner, at which point she started designing and manufacturing clothes. She met her future husband and business partner Alexander Plunkett-Greene at Goldsmiths and they married in 1957. They had a son together called Orlando and were happily married until Plunkett-Greene died in 1990. Quant had one distinct advantage over previous designers: she was a contemporary of her clients, rather than of an older generation.

Convinced that fashion needed to be affordable to be accessible to the young, she opened her own retail boutique, 'Bazaar', on the Kings Road in 1955, with the help of Plunkett-Greene and former solicitor Archie McNair, introducing the 'mod' era and the 'Chelsea Look'. The best-selling items were white plastic collars used to brighten up black dresses or t-shirts and black stretch leggings. In her quest for new and interesting clothes for 'Bazaar', she was not satisfied with the range of clothes available and decided that the shop would have to be stocked with clothes made by herself. Knee-high, white, patent plastic, lace up boots, and tight, skinny rib sweaters in stripes and bold checks, which came to epitomise the 'London Look', were the result. Along with trendy fashion shows and window displays, she secured her reputation through the production of original clothing, sold in affordable boutiques, for the new youth-orientated market. Following on the success of the first Chelsea store, a second Bazaar opened in Knightsbridge in 1961.

By 1963 Mary was exporting to the US, going into mass-production to keep up with the demand, and the Mary Quant worldwide brand was born. The mid 60s saw her at the height of her fame, when she created the micro-mini and the 'paint box' make-up of 1966, and added the shiny, plastic raincoats and little grey pinafore dresses that came to epitomise the 60s fashion era. She expanded her brand further into a range of original patterned tights, a range of cosmetics and other fashion accessories. Quant has claimed that she did not invent the mini skirt but rather the girls who visited her shops did as they wanted them shorter and shorter. These skirts were also in development by other designers but Quant is the name most associated with them. She even named the garments after her favourite make of car - the Mini. In 1966 Quant received her OBE for her contribution to the fashion industry. She arrived at Buckingham Palace to accept the honour in a mini skirt and cut-away gloves. In the same year, she wrote her first book 'Quant by Quant'. She has since gone on to write books on make up and another autobiography.

Quant went on to popularise hot pants in the late 1960s and concentrated on household goods and make up as well as clothes during the 1970s and 1980s. In 1988 she designed the interior of the Mini Designer, which incorporated black and white striped seats with red trimming and seatbelts. In 2000, she resigned as director of Mary Quant LTD, her cosmetics company, after a Japanese buy-out. Mary Quant - - Biography.com Mary Quant London designer Mary Quant is immortalized by fashion iconography as the originator of the miniskirt. IN THESE GROUPS Famous British People Synopsis Immortalized by fashion iconography as the originator of the miniskirt, London designer Mary Quant had an art-school background and had been designing and manufacturing her own clothes since the late 1950s. She had one distinct advantage over previous designers: She was a contemporary of her clients, rather than of an older generation.

Convinced that fashion needed to be affordable to be accessible to the young, she opened her own retail boutique, Bazaar, on the Kings Road in 1955, introducing the "mod" era and the "Chelsea look." Early Life Mary Quant was born on February 11, 1934, in Blackheath, London, England, to Welsh teachers Jack and Mary Quant, who were originally from mining families. She went to Blackheath High School before studying illustration at Goldsmiths College. Quant achieved a diploma in art education from Goldsmiths and went on to become an apprentice couture milliner, at which point she began designing and manufacturing clothes. She met her future husband and business partner, Alexander Plunkett-Greene, at Goldsmiths. The couple wed in 1957 and had a son together, Orlando. The two were happily married until Plunkett-Greene's death in 1990. Famed Fashion Designer Quant had one distinct advantage over previous designers: she was a contemporary of her clients, rather than of an older generation.

Convinced that fashion needed to be affordable to be accessible to the young, she opened her own retail boutique, Bazaar, on the Kings Road in 1955, with the help of Plunkett-Greene and former solicitor Archie McNair, introducing the "mod" era and the "Chelsea look." The best-selling items were white plastic collars used to brighten up black dresses or T-shirts and black stretch leggings. In her quest for new and interesting clothes for Bazaar, Quant wasn't satisfied with the range of clothes available and decided that the shop would have to be stocked with clothes made by herself. Knee-high, white, patent plastic, lace-up boots and tight, skinny rib sweaters in stripes and bold checks, which came to epitomize the "London look," were the result. Along with trendy fashion shows and window displays, she secured her reputation through the production of original clothing, sold in affordable boutiques, for the new youth-orientated market. Following on the success of the first Chelsea store, a second Bazaar opened in Knightsbridge in 1961.

By 1963, Quant was exporting to the United States, going into mass-production to keep up with the demand, and the Mary Quant worldwide brand was born. The mid-1960s saw Quant at the height of her fame, when she created the micro-mini and the "paint box" makeup of 1966, and added the shiny, plastic raincoats and little grey pinafore dresses that came to epitomize the 1960s fashion era. She expanded her brand further into a range of original patterned tights, a range of cosmetics and other fashion accessories. Quant has claimed that she did not invent the miniskirt, but, rather, the girls who visited her shops did, as they wanted them shorter and shorter. These skirts were also in development by other designers, but Quant's is the name most associated with them. She even named the garments after her favorite make of car: the Mini. In 1966, Quant received her Order of the British Empire for her contribution to the fashion industry. She arrived at Buckingham Palace to accept the honor in a miniskirt and cut-away gloves.

That same year, she wrote her first book, Quant by Quant, and has since gone on to write books on make up and another autobiography. Late 1960s and Beyond Quant went on to popularize hot pants in the late '60s, and concentrated on household goods, makeup and clothes during the 1970s and '80s. In 1988, she designed the interior of the Mini Designer, which incorporated black and white striped seats with red trimming and seatbelts. In 2000, Quant resigned as director of Mary Quant LTD, her cosmetics company, after a Japanese buy-out. Fact Check We strive for accuracy and fairness. If you see something that doesn't look right, contact us ! Citation Information Mary Quant - a new approach: Chelsea 1955–1967 Window dressing at Bazzar, 138a King's Road, 1959.

© Getty Images 'Snobbery has gone out of fashion, and in our shops you will find duchesses jostling with typists to buy the same dresses.' Mary Quant Around this time a group of young artists, film directors and socialites gravitated towards the King's Road. Known by the media as the 'Chelsea Set', they made the name Chelsea synonymous with a new way of living and dressing. Mary Quant's boutique, set up in 1955, epitomised this new philosophy and set the standard for later entrepreneurs. Called Bazaar, it was known for its surreal window displays and eclectic mix of clothes, accessories and costume jewellery. The clothes were decidedly modern. 'I want relaxed clothes,' said Quant, 'suited to the actions of normal life'. With Quant's husband Alexander Plunkett Greene and friend Archie McNair providing the business backup, the venture was profitable, though it appeared chaotic. Some of the goods were sourced from art students, or made up overnight, and the mini shift dress soon became Quant's trademark.

Retail innovation: Knightsbridge 1961–1967 'A whole new world of retail sprang up.' Felicity Green In the 1950s Knightsbridge was dominated by the stuffy department stores frequented by debutantes and their mothers. The first traditional store to cater specifically for the youth market was Woollands. In 1961, inspired by Mary Quant, it opened the '21 Shop' as an in-store boutique for young working women. 21 Shop sold clothes that were 'simple, zany, not for squares'. The buyer, 22-year-old Vanessa Denza, sought out new talent in the Royal College of Art and worked closely with young designers. Brilliant at turnover, she could get an order of 1000 dresses delivered within a week and sold a week later. 'Like a dam bursting' (to use Denza's phrase) other retailers soon followed her lead, with Young Jaeger, Harrods' Way In and Miss Selfridge establishing themselves as household names. Unlike her art school peers, Jean Muir learned her trade in the fashion industry.

Celebrated as a gifted dressmaker, she worked for Liberty, Jaeger and Jane and Jane during the 1950s and '60s. Her clothes were always a subtle demonstration of the sculptural qualities of fabric, with suede a particular favourite. Menswear revolution: Piccadilly 1964–1970 'I remember going to Turnbull & Asser and having a bright pink shirt made, then being asked to leave the Cavalry Club for wearing it. This happened again in about 1966. I was wearing a white suit made by Blades.... I was asked to leave Annabel's Nightclub for having a white suit on!' David Mlinaric, interior designer. Fashion-conscious young men set out to challenge the staid rules of masculine etiquette that had prevailed since Victorian times. Circulating in the overlapping worlds of fashion, the media and high society, they forged new styles of dress and deportment. The result was the modern dandy, a flamboyant figure in frills and velvet, whose adventurous wardrobe perfectly suited the creative atmosphere of the time. A new group of entrepreneurs, often from aristocratic backgrounds, spotted this shift in taste.

They moved into the area around Piccadilly Circus, long famous for dressing the British gentleman, and opened shops whose peacock products combined traditional tailoring with the design flair of fashion graduates. Many of the new designers had emerged from the first menswear courses, recently set up at the Royal College of Art and London College of Fashion. The results were spectacular, a new 'man about town'. Suit, Tom Gilbey, about 1968. Museum nos. T.642:1, 2-1995; T.643-1995 Suit, Blades, 1968. Museum no. T.353-1980 The rise of the boutique: King's Road 1965–1970 'The King's Road is a wilderness of stoned harlequins.' Christopher Gibbs, antique dealer. Mary Quant's Bazaar, 'the grandmother of all the little shops', provided a new way of shopping. Until then, mature women had bought their clothes in department stores or gone to dressmakers, while many young women created their own outfits. Young graduates and enthusiastic amateurs sensed the new spirit in fashion and plunged in.

Taking advantage of cheap rents on the King's Road, they opened their own boutiques among the fish shops and greengrocers, attracting customers with their outlandish names and anarchic window displays. A visit to the King's Road became a journey towards self-expression. On a Saturday afternoon the Rolling Stones and the new pop aristocracy would mix with the crowds, and shoppers emerged transformed, as suede-clad American Indians or romantic heroines in satin and lace. The heart of swinging London: Carnaby Street 1964–1972 Carnaby Street, London, Lord Kitchener, late 1960s 'Working class design, British fashion, Rock and Roll, The Beatles, Carnaby Street... You had all these rebels without causes, and all of a sudden everything came together. The gods smiled.' Robert Orbach, retailer. Carnaby Street became synonymous with the idea of Swinging London. Using the skills of the established Soho 'rag trade', it sold relatively inexpensive, trend-driven merchandise that mirrored contemporary changes in society and culture. In the early days, the clientele was linked to showbusiness.

Then, from the mid 1960s, working-class Mods came flocking into the brash outlets of John Stephen (the 'King of Carnaby Street') in search of sharp Italian-style suits. By 1968 shoppers could also find mini-dresses, kaftans, shirts and accessories provocatively emblazoned with patriotic symbols and counter-cultural slogans. Carnaby Street has often been dismissed as a garish tourist trap. But in its hey-day the clothes and attitude sold there revealed the key Sixties characteristics of innovation, iconoclasm and fun. Above all, they echoed the prevailing spirit of sexual and political revolution. Exoticism and nostalgia: London's bohemia 1967–1973 'Second hand furniture, old houses, old clothes… Oh God, those vast, whitewashed rooms with bare floorboards and a mattress in the corner with an Indian coverlet on it…. The pure asceticism of the late sixties.' Angela Carter, novelist. In the late 1960s futuristic themes gave way to exoticism, romanticism and nostalgia. Drugs, the counter-culture and the hippy trail to India suggested an alternative to the commercial fashion scene.

Rediscovery of Victorian artists such as Aubrey Beardsley and William Morris stimulated a revival of historic and rural styles. The result was an eclectic combination of the ethnic, the antique and the psychedelic. Many of the clothing trends of the early 1970s originated in the decadent milieu of London's bohemian quarters: Chelsea, Notting Hill and Kensington. These districts offered a faded grandeur that appealed to those with limited budgets and boundless imaginations. Large derelict flats and empty retail spaces offered an ideal environment for pop stars, artists and entrepreneurs to develop alternative approaches to life, business and fashion. Biba: Kensington and beyond 1964–1974 Biba, High Street Kensington Shop, london, photograph by Philip Townsend. © Victoria & Albert Museum, London 'The most 'In' shop for gear…. A must scene for the switched on dolly bird.' Time, April 1966. Barbara Hulanicki opened her first Biba store in an old chemist's stop in Abingdon Road in 1964. Her last, and most ambitious, enterprise was to take over Derry & Tom's department store on the High Street in 1973.

What linked all the Biba stores was Hulanicki's skill in creating environments that complimented the romantic, sensual appeal of her clothing. The atmosphere was unique, with loud music, stylish staff, dimly lit period interiors and chaotic changing rooms. The clothes were also good value, so young working women could shop alongside models, singers and TV personalities. Through a combination of mail order, distinctive branding and an understanding ofits customers' dreams, Biba set a template for the 'lifestyle' approach that would go on to support British retail successes in the 1980s and '90s. Out of London: Paris and New York 1965–1968 'They were looking at us and we were looking at them.' Sylvia Ayton, designer. Until the 1960s, London's clothing industry operated in the shadow of the great Parisian couturiers. Paris, with its focus on made-to-measure garments for a fabulously wealthy, elite group of women, was the hub of international fashion. But suddenly, with the growth of the youth market, London began to set the pace.

Paris maintained its edge thanks to a group of young designers trained in the couture tradition but thinking into the future. Fashion houses such as Cardin, Courrèges and Saint Laurent learned to reach younger consumers. They opened ready-to-wear boutiques and concessions in department stores, and created 'space age' garments that were instantly copied in the high street. In the United States, the youth market was massive and department stores made millions by importing London designs. But retailers also realised the potential of the boutique. In New York especially, homegrown boutiques flourished, selling exclusive, avant-garde designs to a sophisticated clientele. Barbara MARY Plunket Greene (Quant) - Genealogy Genealogy Join the world's largest family tree Gender Is your surname Plunket Greene?

Research the Plunket Greene family Share your family tree and photos with the people you know and love Build your family tree online Share photos and videos Barbara MARY Plunket Greene (Quant) Birthdate: Feb 11 1934 - Kent, England Husband: Feb 11 1934 - Blackheath, London Husband: Feb 11 1934 - Kent, England Husband: Feb 11 1934 - Kent, England Husband: Feb 11 1934 - Kent, England Husband: Feb 11 1934 - Kent, England Husband: Feb 11 1934 - Kent, England Husband: Jack Quant, Mildred Quant (born Jones) Brother: Mary Quant OBE, FCSD is a fashion designer and British fashion icon. Born in England to Welsh parents on 11 February 1934, she became an instrumental figure in the 1960s London-based Mod and youth fashion movements.

She was one of the designers who took credit for the miniskirt and hot pants, and by promoting these and other fun fashions she encouraged young people to dress to please themselves and to treat fashion as a game. Ernestine Carter, an authoritative and influential fashion journalist of the 1950s and '60s, wrote: "It is given to a fortunate few to be born at the right time, in the right place, with the right talents. In recent fashion there are three: Chanel, Dior, and Mary Quant." Barbara MARY Plunket Greene's Timeline 1934 BIOGRAPHY OF MARY QUANT| [MARY QUANT COSMETICS LTD.] Born in London on February 11. 1955 Opens her first boutique, BAZAAR in Kings Road, Chelsea (London). The mini-skirt sensation begins. 1957 The second Bazaar store opens in Knightsbridge, (London). Mary Quant marries her partner, the late Alexander Plunkett Greene. 1962 Enters the American market with the conclusion of a licensing agreement with J. C. Penny for clothing and underwear design.

From this point onward, Mary Quant is inundated with requests for designs in various fields, not only from Britain, but also Europe and the United States. 1963 Wins the SUNDAY TIMES INTERNATIONAL AWARD and is selected as the WOMAN OF THE YEAR. Establishes GINGER GROUP, launching global-scale production and wholesaling of Mary Quant designed clothing. 1964 Wins the Maison Branch Rex Award. （U.S.A.） 1966 Begins design of cosmetics; launches MARY QUANT COSMETICS. Made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for her achievement with the mini skirt. Wins the Piavla d’Ora Award （ITALY）. Her autobiography, QUANT BY QUANT is published. 1967 Selected as a Fellow of the Society of Industrial Artists（F.S.I.A.） and wins that year’s design award. 1969 Selected as a Royal Designer for Industry（R.D.I.）. Inducted into the British Fashion Council Hall of Fame for her enormous contribution to British fashion. 1970 Begins interior and textile design. Son Orlando is born. Sale of Mary Quant cosmetics in Japan begins in March.

1972 Mary Quant visits Japan for the 1st time. 1973 Hold a special exhibition, MARY QUANT’S LONDON at the London Museum. Appointed as a member of the 200th Anniversary of Diplomatic Relations between Great Britain and the United States Committee. 1975 The BBC broadcasts a 1 hour-length special film entitled LIFE OF MARY QUANT. 1977 Mary Quant visits Japan for the 2nd time. 1982 Mary Quant visits Japan for the 3rd time. 1983 Sale of the Mary Quant Collection (leotards, tights, socks, leg warmers) in Japan begins. MARY QUANT AT HOME, a grand collection of interior-related designs, is launched in New York. 1984 COLOUR BY QUANT, a book about color by Mary Quant, is published. 1985 Wins the Pret-a-porter Fashion Federation Award (France). 1986 QUANT ON MAKEUP, a book about make-up by Mary Quant, is published in Britain and creates a sensation. 1987 The Japanese language edition of QUANT ON MAKEUP is published. Mary Quant visits Japan for the book launch.

1989 MARY QUANT’S STYLE FILE, a video about make-up, is released in Britain. 1990 Archie McNair, entrepreneur - obituary - Telegraph Archie McNair, entrepreneur - obituary Businessman who provided the financial foundations to Mary Quant’s Swinging Sixties salon Archie McNair, right, with Mary Quant and Alexander Plunket Greene Photo: Corbis 5:38PM BST 15 Jul 2015 Archie McNair, who has died aged 95, was the entrepreneur whose business acumen and financial foresight underpinned the international impact of the Swinging London pop culture phenomenon of the 1960s. McNair was the behind-the-scenes figure in the success of the fashion designer Mary Quant and her husband, the late Alexander Plunket Greene. He was the investor in the country’s first boutique – Quant and Plunket Greene’s Bazaar, which opened at 138a King’s Road in autumn 1955 – and the canny overseer of the subsequent expansion which communicated such so-called “Youthquake” styles as the mini-skirt across the Atlantic.

McNair’s legal training and acute attention to detail were applied to the deals he struck on Quant’s behalf with such partners as the giant US retail chain JC Penney. By understanding that licensing contracts spread brand awareness without the pressures of dealing with manufacturers (since this becomes the responsibility of the other party), McNair revolutionised the post-war British fashion industry, developing a business model which pertains to this day. Yet McNair was not a typical “suit” . He enjoyed the thrill of risk-taking, and had been at the forefront of London’s property, photography and coffee-bar scenes even before he encountered the young Goldsmith Art School graduates Plunket Greene and Quant. They first met McNair at his Fantasie café, below his portrait photography studio at 128 King’s Road, hard by the Markham Arms, then the hub of the raffish Chelsea set. In the 1970s, while still chairman of the Quant label’s parent company Ginger Group, McNair ran the trading company Thomas Jourdan, and engineered a series of acquisitions, including the Corby of Windsor trouser press business.

Under McNair’s guidance, Corby products were updated to include a heated range, and so became near-universal fixtures in hotels around the world. Archibald Alister Jourdan McNair was born on December 16 1919 in Tiverton, one of six children of Donald and Janie Grace McNair, who were members of the Plymouth Brethren. His father owned the Patchquick factory in the Devon town, manufacturers of a range of then-popular tyre repair kits . On leaving Blundell’s School, which he had attended as a day boy, McNair took articles with a solicitor’s practice in Exeter. These were interrupted by the war. Since his non-conformist upbringing precluded active service, he became an auxiliary fireman in London, where duties included piloting the boats on the Thames pumping water for fire-fighters during the Blitz. After the war, McNair took the difficult decision to leave the Brethren, which, as his son Hamish explained, “meant saying goodbye to some of his family and starting a new life”. He completed his articles and worked in conveyancing and property law at a London practice.

A small legacy enabled the purchase of 128 King’s Road, where McNair opened the first-floor studio and became a professional portrait photographer. Among his subjects was the virtuoso classical horn player Dennis Brain. The address became a drop-in spot for the Chelsea set, and McNair, tiring of preparing constant rounds of cups of coffee for his friends, bought the second commercial Gaggia machine imported into the country . McNair opened the Fantasie in the summer of 1954, intending to provide customers with 24-hour service. Nocturnal unpleasantness from local Teddy Boys persuaded him to investigate alternative business opportunities, and he put up a 50 per cent share of the £8,000 required by Quant and Plunket Greene to open Bazaar on the corner of Markham Square. Bazaar was an immediate success, spawning imitators and sparking the British boutique boom. McNair was integral to the smooth running of the operation. Andrew Loog Oldham, the manager of the Rolling Stones who had worked at the retail outlet as a sales assistant, recalled later: “The three of them, Mary, Alexander and Archie, were in total harmony.

They didn’t need words and when they used them, so very well, they could finish each other’s sentences. There was love, and it was apparent. In their own fashion, the Quant trio were very disciplined, but they really improvised the whole thing. I will always thank them for teaching me about fame, fashion, money and how to have fun getting it done.” Although the Quant business was often seat-of the-pants, McNair’s determination and strong judgment provided a secure financial basis as the fashion designs and make-up lines proved popular from Tokyo to Idaho. In 1971 McNair bought an off-the-shelf shell company and transformed it into Thomas Jourdan, acquiring engineering firms as well as Corby, whose Windsor base provided the headquarters for the group. He stood down as chairman of the Ginger Group in 1988, having suffered near-fatal injuries when hit by a taxi near St James’s Park. Nevertheless, McNair enjoyed a long retirement, during which he oversaw the building of a house near Marbella, and remained proud to have been an integral – though rarely cited – figure in the 1960s fashion and pop culture explosion.

McNair was predeceased by his wife Cathy (née Fleming), to whom he was married for 60 years; he died on the first anniversary of her funeral service. He is survived by his son and daughter. Archie McNair, born December 16 1919, died July 2 2015 Mary Quant put the swing into the 60s, gave us that iconic bob cut and - hallelujah! - invented waterproof mascara | Daily Mail Online comments She no longer lives here, but Mary Quant is back in Chelsea, the place she put on the map half a century ago. Back then, England was swinging like a pendulum; it was all Twiggy and The Beatles; the dawn of a bright new mad, mod world. And Mary Quant was right at the beating heart of it all. From her King’s Road boutique called Bazaar, Quant invented hot pants and the Chelsea Girl look, helped popularise the mini-skirt, created the skinny rib sweater and changed the face of make-up for ever. 'I mostly felt, my God, what a marvellous life you had, you are very fortunate.

I think to myself, you lucky woman - how did you have all this fun?' said Mary Quant, who has just written her autobiography She designed the kind of sexy, affordable clothes her arty friends wanted to wear; tiny tunic dresses, knickerbockers, flared hipster trousers. Then everyone else wanted them, too — and the effect they had was sensational. This incredible tale of the rise and rise of one of Britain’s greatest fashion innovators is chronicled in a new book, to be serialised in the Daily Mail next week. The celebrated designer’s new autobiography reveals what it was like to be at the epicentre of the youthquake that dragged the UK out from the shadows of post-war austerity to blink in the can-do glare of the new pop culture. RELATED ARTICLES Share this article Share It also sheds light on the definitive relationship of Quant’s life; her tempestuous but happy marriage to her business partner, Alexander Plunket Greene. She had the designs, APG — as she calls him in her book — had a knack for zany marketing ideas that chimed perfectly with the age.

He named Quant’s eye shadows Jeepers Peepers, called a range of gel cosmetics Jelly Babies and sold them in tiny baby bottles, dreamed up Pop Sox and called her new range of natural-shaped bras Booby Traps. Looking back on all this does not make the modest Miss Quant feel proud, just rather amazed. ‘I mostly felt, my God, what a marvellous life you had, you are very fortunate,’ she says. ‘I think to myself, you lucky woman — how did you have all this fun?’ At the cutting edge: Mary still sports the sharp bob created for her by Vidal Sassoon. Now she has her hair cut in a Vidal Sassoon salon in Chelsea by one of his employees. Love that loyalty! Chief among her revolutionary innovations were tights for mini-skirts and waterproof mascara; all of a sudden women could cry, swim and run for the bus while still looking good. The importance of these things, individually and collectively, should not be overlooked. There are some who have been given damehoods for less, although Quant is merely grateful for the opportunities that came her way. ‘It was the spirit of the time.

Yes, I worked very hard, but I loved the work, it was delicious.’ Today, her Bazaar is just another coffee shop, selling hot pastries instead of hot pants. Ironic really, given Mary Quant’s trenchant fashion-world view on the eternal size zero debate. ‘It is the bones [of the woman wearing them] that make dresses look wonderful; it is the bones, when they jut out at the right place. ‘There is no perfect size, it is all about the bones in the end,’ she says. But if you are a size 14, I suggest, then you won’t have many bones jutting out at all. ‘No. So it is worth getting them,’ she retorts. ‘Of course, I remember when everybody was thin. It wasn’t until I went to America in the Sixties that I saw anyone who wasn’t skinny thin. ‘At the end of the war here, everyone was thin, thin, thin.’ And for the record, Mary Quant still thinks Chelsea is rather exciting. ‘Oh yes, I still like the King’s Road. It is very alive, it is a hustle of things from different countries and so on. It is lovely,’ she says.

Miss Quant has been driven up from her country home in Surrey for the day. She will be 78 next week and is slightly crimped at the edges by an arthritic complaint, but she remains instantly recognisable. Sitting at a corner table in the hotel lounge, she is small and chic in her Breton sweater, pin-striped trousers and sheepskin boots. Her biker-type studded leather belt is a Quant original, with her trademark daisy motif suspended on a silver chain. Lightly tanned, she is wearing a lot of smoky-grey eye shadow and is the best advertisement for her maxim that style never goes out of style. Indeed, she still has exactly the same hairdo; an auburn version of the symmetrical bob she helped make famous in ye olde Swinging London. Originally it was cut by Vidal Sassoon himself, now she has it cut in a Vidal Sassoon salon in Chelsea by one of his employees. Love that loyalty! Shall we have a coffee? Mary looks a little disappointed. Coffee and perhaps some… wine? That’s better. She orders a glass of dry white and an espresso, then ignores the espresso.

However, perhaps one of the reasons why this daughter of two Welsh schoolteachers survived the maelstrom of the Sixties intact was that she was always grounded, sensible, disciplined. She is quite a shy person, but also very controlled. ‘I have been on a diet since 1962,’ she says, citing black coffee, tomatoes, avocadoes, basil and olive oil as her slimming staples. ‘You can gobble up as much of them as you like,’ she says. Once when Mary was exhausted from finishing collections, her doctor prescribed amphetamines. 'He should have told me to go to bed early and stop working so hard and then staying up all night,' she said And when all around her were off their heads on various substances way back when, she would eschew drugs for the occasional fortifying glass of Sancerre. ‘Stick to some lovely white wine or red wine. You don’t need to get into that dangerous stuff,’ she says, raising her glass. ‘I always found drugs terrifying, and in the Sixties they were everywhere.’ Once when she was exhausted from finishing collections, her doctor prescribed amphetamines.

‘He should have told me to go to bed early and stop working so hard and then staying up all night, but instead he gave me purple hearts. ‘For a few weeks, life was terrifying. I would be crossing the road and the pavement was roaring up to meet me. Too dangerous for words.’ Anyway, work was Mary Quant’s drug of choice. Work and her beloved APG, whom she met at Goldsmiths’ College of Art in London. In her book, she describes him as a ‘a 6ft 2in prototype for Mick Jagger and Paul McCartney rolled into one’. He had long hair, played jazz trumpet and wore his mother’s gold silk pyjamas to class. Later, the couple once hit the headlines when she revealed that he trimmed her pubic hair into a heart shape. A waiter once served her a heart-shaped steak tartare in silent tribute, John Lennon sent her sketches of suggestions for new shapes. ‘I’m not going to tell you what they were, that is between John and I,’ she says. She moved into Belgravia with APG, a life-affirming bon viveur whose entrepreneurial skills were perfectly matched to the freewheeling times.

Yet if there is a dark side to the Sixties, perhaps it is distilled in Plunket Greene and his appetites, not to mention his early death. He adored Mary but was a dedicated womaniser who also drank too much. He wouldn’t change his ways — not for doctors, nor for love. In 1988, Plunket Greene was told he had only two years to live, unless he stopped drinking. He died in 1990, at the relatively young age of 57. 'At the end of the war here, everyone was thin, thin, thin... I have been on a diet since 1962,' said Mary ‘It was unbearable,’ says Quant of his death. ‘Alexander drank too much, which had to do with his death. ‘His doctors suggested he should stop drinking, but he didn’t. He didn’t want to. He loved wine and drinking. ‘He drank too much but he said that life wasn’t worthwhile without wine, that was his attitude. ‘I am sure it killed him in the end. It killed his father, too. ‘It is a very inherited thing. I don’t know how much he drank, I never counted the bottles.

But he loved wine and was always topping up.’ They had a son together, Orlando, who is now 42 and works in computer marketing. He is married with three young children, making Quant a rather glamorous granny. Through good times and bad, she never stopped loving APG, even though the marriage was difficult. ‘Well, the word I would use is riotous, not difficult. 'He was a monstrous womaniser, so it was noisy and bumpy. We had great battles about it. Did he sleep with any of my friends? I am sure he did. I turned a blind eye as much as one could, then I would hurl things. It was wonderful, though. ‘He was loyal at the same time, though. Unfaithful but loyal.’ How does that work? Quant just laughs. During the most turbulent times, she started seeing a psychiatrist — as indeed did her husband — and says today that it helped enormously; it gave her confidence and made it easier for her to understand his behaviour. Not that she was ever too understanding. Although she blames herself for being too focused on work and not paying him enough attention, she was never a designer doormat. ‘Don’t ignore it,’ is her advice.

‘No, no. You must throw things and make a hell of a fuss. Of course, he would always promise never to do it again. There was unhappiness, but I have to say there was also a great deal of happiness, too. ‘Don’t be hard on him, it was just the spirit of the times. ‘He was such fun to be with. He was the best dancer that ever happened, he really was. And a terrific looker.’ The couple moved in glamorous circles (they went to the wedding of Princess Margaret and the photographer Tony Armstrong-Jones). Around this time, Quant was the first designer to use PVC as a fabric and when Armstrong-Jones was despatched by a magazine to take pictures of her in the hot new wet-look clothes, the Princess became convinced they were having an affair — but that was never Quant’s style. ‘I was a bit slow on that really. I was too besotted with Alexander. He was pretty blinding,’ she says, cheerfully. So what does she make of the newest member of the Royal Family?

Quant says she is a very big admirer of the Duchess of Cambridge, approving of her fondness for ‘a good, light navy blue’ and ability to wear a hat ‘at the right angle’. ‘She has the good sense to stay in marvellous shape and that is wonderful. I am afraid that if you are going to be photographed in fashion, you have to be slim. She does all that and enjoys it and wears things with a kind of flourish and a gusto which makes other people feel happy to see it. ‘She is perfect, we certainly have the right one here. There is nothing boring about her. You know by the way she puts her hat on that she is not a boring woman.’ Mary Quant is a very agreeable woman, both sweet and slightly sharp, like a spritz of grapefruit juice. Many, many years have passed since the days when she would skip along to Quaglino’s for dinner with Alexander, wearing her first little dresses that she made herself after attending cutting classes. To ‘get the gist’ of sizing, she bought Butterick patterns and ‘chopped off what I didn’t want to get the shapes I wanted’.

Less than a year later, she and APG launched their own shop and Butterick asked her to design for them. ‘That was a hell of a boost,’ she says. Now though, Alexander has gone — and so, too, have Mary’s rights to her name, which is used by a Japanese company that manufactures clothes and cosmetics under her imprimatur and trademark. After being ousted, Quant has no direct involvement any more, just the occasional supply of an idea or a thought. All these years of success upon success, she claims, have not left her a fabulously wealthy woman. ‘Well, I have a marvellous ability to get through money. And lawyers are quite good at removing it, too, aren’t they?’ she says. Today, she lives in the house in the country that was left to Alexander by one of his relatives, and she still sleeps in the bed that they bought when they first got married. Now she shares it with the man in her life, Antony Rouse. Originally a friend of both hers and Alexander’s, Antonia Fraser once called him ‘the most beautiful man at Oxford’. Mary says he has the most beautiful feet she has ever seen on a man.

‘After Alexander died, he just gradually moved in,’ she writes. She tells me: ‘It is all terribly lovely because he is just as obsessed with Alexander as I am. He adored him too. He totally understands.’ Mary Quant: My Autobiography is published by Headline at £25 on February 16. To order a copy for £20 (inc P&P), call 0843 382 0000. Mary Quant | Fashion Designer Biography Contact Mary Quant Immortalized as the creator of the mini skirt, Mary Quant was born in Southeast London on February 11, 1934. The only child of award winning Welsh teachers, Mary studied at the Blackheath High School and later took up illustration at Goldsmiths College. She received a diploma in Art Education from Goldsmiths and began working as an apprentice at high-end Mayfair milliner, Erik on Bond Street. She met her beau and business partner, Alexander Plunkett Greene in 1953 and tied the knot in 1957.

Mary’s career was off to a great start when the husband and wife duo teamed up with photographer, Archie McNair in November 1955 to open quant’s first store called Bazaar on King’s Road in London. The first shop got a pretty good response from the customers and so Quant opened her second shop after two years which was designed by Terence Conran. Quant’s early success can be attributed to the ‘mad’ pajamas she designed which made their way to the cover of Harper’s Bazaar along with sweaters and dresses having collars made of shiny white plastic. Soon she had to hire workers in order to cope with the rising demand of her clothes. By 1966, Quant was teaming up with twenty big manufacturers concurrently. Known as the first one to design miniskirts, this was the defining moment in the 1960s fashion and her career too. Skirts were usually quite long in the 1950s but Quant cut them down to size reasonably and turned them into an everyday must-have liberating women enough to catch buses. In 1960s, Quant designed the ‘hot pants’ which once again became an iconic piece in the history of fashion.

She also focused on making makeup and household goods rather than just clothes between the decade of 60s and 70s. Quant also got a chance to design the interior of the car, Mini which had black and white striped and red trimming along with red colored seatbelts. The special edition of Quant’s mini cars were produced in two colors diamond white and jet black. She also joined the Chartered Society of Designers as a member and bagged the society’s highest award, the Minerva Medal. In the year 2000, Mary was reassigned as the director of her cosmetic company, Mary Quant Cosmetics Ltd after the Japanese took over. Japan has over 200 Mary Quant color shops where clients can get a taste of Quant’s fashion. Quant’s outstanding career is decorated with many prestigious awards. She is said to be the first winner of the Designer of the Year Award in 1963. In 1966, she was appointed the Order of the British Empire for her years of dedication and valuable contributions to the fashion industry and in 1990, she won the British Council’s Hall of Fame Award.

Quant also wrote some books about her career as a fashion designer in which she gave a detailed account of her work like her first autobiography, Quant by Quant in 1966. In 1984, she published her second book Color by Quant . Quant talked about makeup in her third book, Quant on Make-up which was published in 1987 with another book on makeup in tow called Classic Makeup and Beauty Book published in 1998. Her last book was her second biography which came out in 2011 by the name of Mary Quant: Autobiography . Mary Quant - Bio, Facts, Family | Famous Birthdays Mary Quant Aquarius Named Mary#6 About English fashion designer and British fashion icon who became famous for creating and popularizing key clothing pieces like the mini skirt and hot pants. Before Fame She studied Art Education at Goldsmiths College prior to becoming a designer. Trivia She became the first winner of the Dress of the Year Award in 1963. Family Life She met her future husband and business partner, Alexander Plunkett-Greene, at Goldsmiths. They were married from 1957 until his death in 1990.

Question: Which 60's fashion designer was married to Alexander Plunkett Greene
Answer: Mary Quant